Here I make one or two fine distinctions. Think carefully about this. Not all talents are necessarily spiritual gifts. Not all talents necessarily become spiritual gifts. Christians often confuse the two. They say if a believer has a talent, therefore he has the gift. But that is not necessarily the case. What is the purpose of the gifts? What are gifts for? Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12:7, They are for the common good, or 1 Corinthians 14:26, They are for building up.

Now, the following is very important. This will always happen. If it does not happen, the gift is not present. To take an example, a man may be a fluent speaker, he may be an intelligent man, he may be able to read the Bible, he may be able to construct and deliver sermons, but if people are not blessed by the sermons, if the Spirit does not work through the sermons, he does not have the spiritual gift of preaching. He has the natural talent as a speaker. He has the natural talent as a student, but he may not have the spiritual gift of preaching. A man may have much less natural talent, he may not be as intelligent, he may not be as articulate, he may not be as compelling a speaker—his natural talents are less—but when he stands up and preaches the Word, people are blessed, converted, and helped. Do you see the point? His natural talents are less, but God the Holy Spirit has given to that man the spiritual gift of utterance and preaching. So, it is an easy mistake to make to equate the talents with the gifts. Gifts are talents which are used by the Spirit.

JI Packer says the following, An ability is only a gift if and as God uses it to edify. It is God’s use of our abilities, rather than the abilities themselves that constitutes giftedness. I will repeat that. It is God’s use of our abilities that constitutes giftedness. If no regular, identifiable spiritual benefit for others results from what we do, we should not think of our capacity to do it as a spiritual gift. Packer is very careful there; he is very balanced. He is not saying—to go back to the example of preaching—that people are going to be blessed every single time a man speaks. We all have dull days. We all have flat days. There are days when preachers struggle and people do not get much from what is said. But if people are never blessed, never helped spiritually, and are never made more like Christ, then that person should not be on the pulpit.

A man may have a talent for leadership and be a natural leader, but if he cannot lead the people of God wisely, peacefully, and harmoniously in the ways of Christ, he does not have the spiritual gift of leadership. A woman may be a very fine counsellor with degrees and so on in counselling and giving advice, but if people are not spiritually helped as a result of her counselling, she does not have the gift.

In fact, God often uses lesser talents and he bypasses greater talents. Are we not guilty of overlooking this? Do we often not find ourselves looking for the talent and not asking, is there a gift? If, for example, your congregation is looking for another minister, where is your focus? Are you going to say, we want the greatest talent? Or are you going to say, we want a man who is gifted by the Spirit, so that as you listen to him you are helped and blessed?

Gifts then are talents transformed by the Spirit, redirected by the Spirit, developed by the Spirit, and used by the Spirit.¹

Edward Donnelly